The Quiet Streets of Winslow

November 4, 2013
Troy’s first novel since 1999’s From the Black Hills is a quiet, intelligent literary whodunit set in two small towns in Arizona. A crime and its aftermath is shown from three perspectives: those of high school student Travis Aspenall; his much older half-brother, Nate; and Sam Rush, the matter-of-fact, careful deputy sheriff who patrols an impossibly wide swath of this bleak, rugged terrain. The story opens in Black Canyon City, when Travis and his younger brother, Damien, find the body of Jody Farnell, a troubled young woman who had been fitfully employed as a waitress and loosely connected to Nate (he was in love with Jody; she didn’t return his affections). Troy slowly and methodically unfolds the story of Jody’s murder, as well as the stories of her three narrators and a large supporting cast. As in small towns everywhere, the locals all seem to know each other’s business, but at the same time, as Travis puts it, “There was always a way in which people in general were sort of strangers to each other.” At times the narrators sound overly insightful, but the prose has a poetic sensibility that allows the novel to transcend the mystery genre. Agent: Georges Borchardt, Georges Borchardt Literary Agency.

January 1, 2014

Long-absent Troy (West of Venus) returns with a desert-tinted triptych featuring three narrators. Deputy Sam Rush works an investigation of the murder of virgin/whore Jody Farnell; Nate Aspenall, a prime suspect in the murder and Jody's would-be lover, thinks existentially; and teen Travis Aspenall observes all, including his own coming-of-age story. The characterizations are sharp and distinct, the prose straightforward and elegant. Troy occasionally overreaches: a way too involved and precocious high school English class tackles Robert Frost's poem "Mending Wall" with such avidity that teachers might be moved to hilarity, envy, or nausea, and at one point, the ordinarily staid deputy quotes George Meredith, of all people. Well, it is fiction. Oh, the mystery? It's never officially closed, but acute attention to two details at the end by Nate and Travis will give readers the answer that Deputy Rush suspects but cannot prove. VERDICT Something for everyone, from murder to local color to interior psychology; like C.J. Box meets Anna Quindlen.--Robert E. Brown, Oswego, NY

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Starred review from November 15, 2013
Within the framework of a murder mystery set in small-town Arizona, Troy (From the Black Hills, 1999, etc.) has written a tightly constructed psychological study about a family and community. Fourteen-year-old Travis and his younger brother Damien find a woman's body while walking their dog in Black Canyon City, Ariz., where their father, Lee, is a veterinarian. Lee's best friend, Sam, is the local sheriff investigating the case, which soon points uncomfortably close to home. It turns out the dead woman is Jody, a waitress whom the boys met with Lee when he took them to visit their much older half brother Nate, the son Lee had in his troubled, alcoholic youth before he became the upstanding citizen, family man and father he is now. Raised by his single mother and now in his early 30s, Nate had a rough time growing up and has become an underachieving loner who manages a trailer park in Chino Valley, where he met Jody. Drawn to her physically--as is every man she meets--and sympathetic to her grief over giving up her daughter to the Indian parents of the baby's father, Nate let Jody live in his trailer for six months. Although he was clearly in love with her and she was giving her sexual favors elsewhere, their relationship remained platonic until she moved back to her hometown of Winslow to be closer to her mother. Nate visited Jody at least once, but no one, including the reader, wants to believe he was the murderer; certainly not Travis, who is having his own coming-of-age experience of unrequited love, or Lee, feeling guilty that he failed Nate as a father. Trying to remain objective, Sam finds navigating through the evidence particularly difficult. And soon, he finds other men who had questionable relationships with Jody and who lack alibis for the murder. As each of the primary characters tells his version of events, Troy's subtle but emotionally wrenching prose raises deeply provocative questions about loyalty, morality, human frailty and the power of choice.

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